Intelligent Compaction News

We are pleased to announce the release of Veta 5.2. This version focuses on alignments and additional file support. We added limited support for LandXML files, including the ability to read station information. Support was also added for Leica compaction files and MOBA EVIB compaction files. Zip and Gzip files can also be imported, eliminating the need to extract the data first. Finally, we added support for the AASHTO draft specification for intelligent construction data files. We currently support compaction, thermal profiling, and laser test roller files. Additional information can be found on the new Developers page. All changes are listed below.

Import

Data Files

Fixed: Viewing compaction files can cause data to be incorrect or missing.

Change: The search tool and viewing of pass counts have been removed from this screen. Search tool may return but it is currently not possible to reliably show the pass counts on a per-file basis in this screen. If you need to see this data, use the Filters.

Sublots

Fixed: If the coordinate system was UTM but the Location unit in Options was not meters, the sublots length description was labeled as meters, but the sublots were actually defined using the Location unit (feet or survey feet). The actual distance and unit used by Veta were correctly displayed in the Analysis. UTM is by definition, meters.

Misc

Fixed: Filter groups could sometimes link to filters that no longer exist, causing a crash when applying the filter group. While this does not fix the cause, it will clean groups of bad links.

Pavement engineering firm The Transtec Group led Australia’s first Intelligent Compaction (IC) workshop in Brisbane to share what agencies in the US have learned and experienced in the past 15 years of IC implementation.

IC is a roller-based technology that measures roller passes, compaction temperatures, and stiffness of compacted materials in real-time. It allows for the real-time detection of paving and compaction issues so paving crews can adjust the operation to improve the final pavement quality. Using IC improves construction quality control (QC) and efficiency to make pavements last longer and to reduce maintenance costs.

The workshop, held on May 8, brought together Australian agencies, research groups, contractors, and vendors. It was organized by the Australian Geomechanics Society and co-sponsored by Monash University, the Australian Road Research Board (ARRB), Queensland University of Technology (QUT), FSG Geotechnics & Foundations, Insitu Test, and the Australian Asphalt Pavement Association (AAPA). Topics covered included IC basics/theory/models, how IC can be implemented, lessons-learned from implementation in the US and China, a demonstration of Veta software, IC case studies from Australia, and a vibrant panel discussion.

Those in the panel discussion included an executive of AAPA, which plans to support road agency and industry members in the introduction of IC and address any barriers.

“The Australian Asphalt Pavement Association and its members are interested in IC as part of our industry’s commitment to continual improvement,” said Dr. Erik Denneman, AAPA Director of Technology and Leadership. “We expect that IC will lead to increased uniformity of compaction.”

Peter Evans, the Deputy Chief Engineer with the Department of Transport and Main Roads (TMR) of Queensland, was also member of the panel discussion.

“It was interesting to see how well-developed IC technology is now and its increasing use in the US,” said Evans. “I look forward to working with the industry to introduce this into TMR.”

Dr. George Chang, Director of Research at The Transtec Group, led the workshop.

“The main takeaway from Transtec’s IC workshops is for agencies, groups, and companies to fully understand IC’s benefits and see how it can be a great quality control tool,” said Dr. Chang.

The Transtec Group recently provided complete consulting support to the Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT) during a year-long IC and infrared scanning (IR) demonstration project. Because of the success of the project, MoDOT has committed to fully implementing IC by 2021.

Other agencies or companies interested in IC or IR—also known as paver-mounted thermal profiling (PMTP)—can get started with the Intelligent Construction Technical Support Center. Services offered include online HelpDesk support for Veta software, training workshops, field project support, and complete support packages.

The Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT) executed a year-long project throughout 2017 to demonstrate the use of intelligent compaction (IC), infrared scanning (IR) and Veta software to improve pavement construction operations. Read more about this Road and Bridges article.

We are pleased to release Veta 5.1. We have included support for MOBA intelligent compaction files, added a new type of location filter, added charts that can be used for quality control, and created a report to list all filter settings.

Because this version only contains new features and fixes, it should be used to replace 5.0. Due to limited resources, we are currently planning to support only 5.1+, not 5.0.

Installation Notes

Veta 5.1 can open projects created in previous versions, but not vice-versa.

Import

New: Added support for MOBA intelligent compaction files.

Fixed: Adding a data file that did not contain any new data could cause a crash when viewing “Imported file name” for an operation filter.

Filters

New: Added a new location filter that be created using only one line from an alignment and offsets. For example, 12 to 24 feet from the centerline. This allows the use of alignments that do not have all lanes defined.

Sublots

Fixed: Changing most of the values did not clear the sublots.

Analysis

New: Added quality control charts using data from sublots. This is the first pass at creating reports that can help for quality control.

Reports

New: Created a new report that lists all filter settings for data lot filter groups. This provides an easier way to check for filter groups that may not have the correct settings.

Change: The screen now attempts to only show the options that are applicable and will disable the “Create” button if the selected options will not produce a report. Note there are still some rare scenarios that will not create a report, but these should only be scenarios that are not practical.

The 40th Years of Continuous Compaction Control (CCC) (or called Intelligent Compaction – IC in the US) Symposium will be held in Vienna, Austria, on November 29, 2018. The abstract will be due on April 30th!! Check out the conference website for further information (www.igb.tuwien.ac.at/en/ccc/).